23 April 2008

you wouldn't guess by the gutters full of plastic bags but india isgoing zero waste. it's happening. the future. happening. now.

we made it nasik after two days of hectic non-bicycle travel, visitingbaskar save's farm in umaragaon on the way. let it be said: there isno relaxing sentimentality in joining the industrial travel movementafter three weeks on a bicycle. none. everyabout the cycle is betterexcept the lack of gears. the AC is silent, the meditationever-present, you can start and stop whenever you please, it ispleasantly free, easy, and clean. no waiting. no bus stations. nopollution. minimum bumpiness, especially with tomas' slovakian seats.

pilgrims! start your bicycles.

but due to the mountains being manlier than we are, we left our horseswith mahesh kothari's school for deaf children in navasari, and tookthe petrochemical route to nasik. one day at baskar save's farm -- itook some notes, they are forthcoming -- who developed through his ownresearch a fukuokan approach to horticulture in gujarat. amazingbounty and beauty, peace and prosperity, a la vez. it's amazing.

and then a few more buses to nasik where 50 people of variousgenerations states and languages have gathered to teach and learnabout waste. it's a week long conference where we all take turnscooking and cleaning together. each day there are various sessions,casually and intentionally disorganized, giving us an opportunity tolearn from each other. movies and music at night. the occasional dipin the local river. and really good people and conversation. so muchlove in the world and so so ever so clear

that plastic is not the way. it just doesnt go away. one of theclearest messages i took away from a talk and slideshow by alex,earlier in the week, is that there is no such thing as "throwingsomething away". There is no such Away. Every Away is Somebody's Here.

so what do we do with all this plastic we generate, if throwing it inthe garbage doesnt get us anywhere, and burning it releases toxicdioxins into the air, and landfills leach toxicity into the soil. theyhave tried everything in the last fifty years and none of it works. itseems the only option is to Stop Generating Plastic, to stop viewingwaste as an option. we are learning to reuse and upcycling everythingwe generate and, more importantly giving consumption patterns andlevels, to stop consuming.

Not accepting food and drink that come in plastic packaging.Working ecological consciousness into desire.Taking responsibility for our trash.

What if everything piece of trash we generated we had to wash andstore under our bed. How long could we keep consuming? How manyplanters would we make out of plastic bottles before we gave up andfound a better way.

Just some basic notes from the zero waste meet. other niceconversations about city farming, worm compost, sanitation, how totalk to people and not offend them, the possibility for a sustainablefuture.

And safe and healthy and finding mangos. Will head out to nearSevagram and Paunar and Wardha and Vasant and Karuna's farm onSaturday.

18 April 2008

he and tomasji have just ended their cycle yatra in the town ofnavsari. we stopped to take a side trip in automobile to see dandi(where i walked a couple of years) ago and go in automobile to thedang forest to check on a school for blind children up in there.

when i conceived of this journey last october, it was limitless. wheni got to india and talked to nirali about it, it would last two orthree months. eventually i realized it should take me to vasant andkaruna futanes' farm in maharastra, and when i heard about thezero-waste meeting in nasik on april 21st, it seemed natural to end itthere.

continuing this trend and flow, we shifted the destination to umargaon(baskar save's farm, the fukuoaka of gujarat, so they say) to avoidunnecessary hurrying and mountain crossing.

in the same spirit, when we realized we had 1.5 days and 130 km to gofrom navsari to umargaon, i was persuaded to back away from thechallenge and chill out. so we did. and celebrated with french fries(indian style, as is everything else in india) and mangos.

lots of beautiful mangos. lots. mango season is finally upon us.

tomorrow we'll take the morning train to see baskar save and the dayafter a night bus to nasik for the next segment of the infiniteintersection. india is as indian as ever.

we cycled over 500 km in 13 days, with 4 rest days. rested with 13families, ashrams, farms, and institutes. all different. a run down tocome. so much reflection. i intentially have kept very little recordbeyond the addresses and phone numbers, so instead of abandoning mycontacts and writing a book as i did last time, this time i willendeavor to stay in touch with the families. and not spend more timewriting books.

so it is. one hearty and encompassing love to all being, including you.

at the house of one girinbhai shad, replete with broadband internetand playing children and lipan mudwork and mango trees. it's been aninteresting parade of characters all disguised as organic farmers overthe last two weeks (we left on the first). nature cure center tocommercial farms, some hardcore spiritual slavedrivers and a fewpeople committed to personal sustainability and doing no harm. youngpersonal management advisors. seasoned mango farmers. all god'speople, naturally.

tomas and i are keeping in good health. tomas had diarrhea for a dayand we somehow kept him still long enough for the ayurvedic andpersonal cures to work. we suspect the interdit sips of slovak liquorhe took in the bathroom were the real curative drops.

there are still people out there who make their own soap and spintheir own clothing, and we have been blessed enough to meet them. idont know what else to say, a little stuck in this world and hard toreach out. but the blessings blow down in tons like the sugarcaneharvest -- we cycle for 4-5 hours in the morning to arrive at a housein the country, to people we've never met, a name we heard perhapsjust the day before. and they make us tea and lemon soda, cook uslunch even though they are fasting, cry when we leave. it's somethingmore than incredible. i am so proud to be somewhat indian, to be ableto look at tomas, amazed, and think, "yes, this is our india".

that much is sure. everything is ours. a guys looks at my flute for afew minutes and we talk and by the time he asks the price -- perhaps 3minutes later -- its not how much did your flute cost or how much didthe flute cost but how much did Our flute cost.

nice like that, you know.

tomas has been gifted with some genius drawing talents. evidence tofollow, shortly.

05 April 2008

from the saddle again. day 6 in the morning and by some miracle of thehindu work ethic and the (more likely) spirit of capitalism, there isa cyber cafe ("mercury") open at 7 in the morning.

feeling the slightest onset of a cold and avoided the typical morningchai in favor of holy basil, cardamom, turmeric, and dry ginger. ihadn't had a cup of tea in two months and have been up to three a dayon the yatra.

submission is the name of the game. so far we've been to two organicfarms, one sanitation center, and one cousin sister's house. it's justthe beginning. yesterday was our first 50 km day. it's trucking alongnicely and nobody has been killed but the roadside dogs.